She's Always A Woman
by jilltveit4
Summary: When Mike is under with a mobster, he discovers a young woman who is in desperate need of some decency, so he takes it upon himself after the arrests to put her up with a job, a place to live, and some genuine empathy. *Set sometime in season 3, AU where Mike didn't get hooked on painkillers*


"Mike, what the hell are you going back in there for?" He doesn't turn around, Briggs keeps calling for him, asking what he's doing, but all he cares about is finding her. The woman that Ronaldo kept talking about. He said that she was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen, but she had fallen on some hard times and got caught up in the chain of sex slavery.

She'd been through 6 different mobs, 6 different sets of men had taken advantage of her, and there was nothing she could do about it. She was too weak, after 10 years of drugs, and alcohol and sex, her body was struggling and Mike wanted to make sure that she was alive, and was willing to do whatever it took to get her back to good health.

"Mike Warren, if you go back in there and get shot, so help me God!" Briggs yells, once again being ignored by Mike. He continues his walk back into the warehouse, his gun in hand. He cocks it since he's not wearing a vest, he needs to be able to defend himself properly.

He walks into a room, with a bed, a closet, and a dresser. Nothing else, the bed had a fitted sheet, and nothing else. He points his gun toward the closet, walking over slowly, before carefully opening the door.

There she was, huddled in the corner, completely naked, bruised and scarred. Her eyes were closed, but he couldn't tell if she was asleep or unconscious. "Cassandra?" She bolts awake, looking up at him, terrified. He puts his gun back in the holster. "I'm a good guy, I'm in the FBI, you're safe." He hears Paul and Johnny run into the warehouse, along with the tact team, arresting the mob members.

"I promise you, you're safe. I'm gonna get you to a hospital, okay?" He extends his hand to her, showing him that he's there to help her. She takes his hand, allowing him to pull her off the cement floor. He pulls his jacket off, putting it over her. "Can you walk okay, or do you need help?"

She shakes her head, "I'm okay." He walks her out slowly, avoiding the eyes of Briggs and Johnny as they continue arresting the guys.

"She needs the medical team, and something to cover up," Mike instructs the agent helping him out of the warehouse so as not to be seen by Ronaldo while he's being arrested. "Sure thing Agent Warren." He runs over to the med team, instructing them of what needs to be done.

When Mike can finally reach the medical team with Cassandra, he helps her up into the ambulance, grabbing a blanket from one of the EMTs, putting it over her, to cover up her lower half. "She needs to be checked all over, but be careful, please." The woman nods, stepping into the ambulance to check Cassandra out. "Wait," Mike hears, faintly as he turns around, "Please don't leave me alone."

"Are you sure?" He walks back, standing in front of her. "Please." She pleads, he gets into the ambulance with her, not leaving her side as the EMT does a physical, before asking her to lie down on the gurney to do a more thorough one.

"What's your name?" Cassandra asks Mike.

"I'm Mike. Are you feeling okay? She's been checking you out for like 5 minutes and you've barely moved." Cassandra nods, "I don't really feel anything, not anymore."

Mike looks at her, with sadness in his eyes. "I'm gonna make sure you're never in harm again, okay?"

"Why do you care so much?" He shrugs, genuinely not sure how to answer that. "I guess I just know what you've been through and I wanna help." She gives him a small smile, grateful that someone wants to help her out and not take advantage of her.

Mike walks Cassandra through the doors of Graceland, he thought nobody else was home and he'd be able to let Cassandra rest so he would have time to explain the situation to his roommates, but instead, he was met with the eyes of Charlie, Paige, and Johnny in the living room. He holds Cassandra close to him, making sure she's covered.

"Mikey, who's this?" Charlie asks, standing up. "This is Cassandra, I talked to the bureau, she's going to be living with us for a while." Paige and Johnny follow Charlie to meet Cassandra. "Where are her clothes? And how did you find her?" Johnny asks.

"John, she was in the warehouse. I'll explain later, right now, I really need Paige and Charlie to help me get her cleaned up and get some clothes, and Johnny, if you could please make her some food that doesn't taste like ass, that would be great." Johnny nods, headed to the kitchen to make some food, and Charlie and Paige help Mike lead Cassandra upstairs to the bathroom in Mike's room.

"I'm gonna be sleeping in the living room on the couch, so Cassandra, you can have my room." She looks up at him, "I don't need a bedroom, I can't take yours from you. I'll be fine on the couch." Mike shakes his head as Paige walks in with some leggings and a lightweight hoodie. "No, I want you far away from the front doors until we are sure we've got all the guys, okay?" She nods as Paige helps her get dressed and Charlie walks in with the food that Johnny made, a plainly grilled cheese sandwich.

"Johnny figured that carbs are what she needs, so he made this." She hands it to Mike, who hands it to Cassandra, who sits down on the bed to eat it. "We will let you get some rest and eat, we'll just be downstairs, so yell if you need us or just come find us, okay?" She nods, setting the plate down on the nightstand, Mike notices that she gets under the covers without eating any of the sandwich. He walks out of the room with Charlie and Paige, to go into the living room to discuss the situation.

In the middle of their debriefing with Paul, Mike heard something upstairs break. "I'll be right back, I'm gonna go check on her." He says, running up the stairs to his room.

"Cas?" He says, opening the door. "You alright?" He walks in the room, seeing a broken picture frame on the floor, with Cas sitting next to it, blood on her arm. He rushes over to her, grabbing her arm, "What happened? Are you alright?" She nods, sobbing quietly, "I was just looking around, and I lost my balance and when I fell, the frame fell too, and now there's glass everywhere. I'm so sorry, Mike."

He looks her in the eyes, "Hey, don't apologize, no worries, Cas. All that matters is that you're okay. Here, let me go get the first-aid kit and I'll clean you up, don't move. I don't want you to get more glass in your arm." She nods as Mike gets up rushing out to the hall closet, where they keep the first aid kit.

"Charlie, can you come help me out? There's glass everywhere."

"Yeah, I'll be up for a second baby."

He walks back into his room, kneeling back down on the floor, taking everything he needed out of the kit. "Okay, I have to pull the glass out, it's gonna hurt, but I have to do it." She nods, wiping the tears off her face with her good arm.

Mike pulls out a pair of tweezers, carefully removing all the tiny pieces of glass from her arm. He watched her face as he pulled the last piece out, and when she didn't react, he got worried. "There, you're all done, let's wrap up your arm, okay?" She didn't move, just let him clean up her arm and wrap it up for her.

Charlie walks into the room just as he finishes up. "Hey, want me to clean up the glass off the floor? You can take her downstairs to lie down, might be better." Mike nods, helping Cas up off the floor, guiding her downstairs as Charlie cleans up his room.

"Cas, are you hungry? I can make you something to eat." Mike offers, handing her a glass of water. "I'm fine, I don't have much of an appetite."

"Oh, did you eat that sandwich that Johnny made?" She shakes her head, "I couldn't." He looks at her, confused, taking a seat on the coffee table, across from her spot on the couch. "Why not?" She shrugs her shoulders, taking a sip of the water.

"If I eat too much stuff like that, nobody will want me. So I tend not to eat a lot of things." Mike puts a hand on her knee, "Hey, you don't have to worry about that stuff anymore."

"How am I gonna make money then? That's my job." He shakes his head, "I talked with the FBI, they are willing to open a position at headquarters for you. You'll be the head of a new task force for finding women and girls just like yourself in the area, women who need help and can't get out of their situation. Whether it's domestic, or not."

"Are you serious? I'd love to do that, but are you sure I'm the right person for it?" He pulls back, "You're the only person I could imagine doing this. I may not know much about you, personally. But, I know a lot about what you've been through, and you're perfect for the job."

"When do I start?"

"Monday, so you have almost a week to collect yourself, and you're more than welcome to live here with all of us, instead of spending money on a new place. I talked to my boss about that as well, and he said it should be fine." She nods, yawning.

"Oh, shit, here, lie down and I'll go upstairs to work on finding a new case. You just get some rest." She lies down on the couch, letting Mike pull a blanket over her.


End file.
